


5 Times Martha Jones Saved the World

by AceQueenKing



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Character Death, Character Death: Suzie Costello, Character Death:Thomas Milligan, F/M, Post-Canon, Sacrifice, Saving the World
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-27
Updated: 2017-10-27
Packaged: 2019-01-23 20:53:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,303
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12516340
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AceQueenKing/pseuds/AceQueenKing
Summary: "I'm MarthafuckingJones," she says, and, for once, the Doctor listens.





	5 Times Martha Jones Saved the World

1\. "I'm Martha Jones," she says through her breathing mask, and if the glittering orb gyrating in front of her knew better, it would be running.

But it doesn't because it's not familiar just yet with her name and all it implies. She watches the seven-dimensional orb that twinkles around Llurghawin, as it blinks toward her. She can almost feel sympathy for it; it's a stranger thrown here by a passing comet, a being that doesn't exist on their dimensional plane, but it's constant desire to acquire oxygen has depleted much of the town's population of air, something humans need to breathe.

Once, when she was a visitor on a strange moon, she had nearly asphyxiated. She remembers how it felt, and her sympathies change. She doesn't know if orbs are sentient, if they're evolved enough to feel remorse, but regardless, it is a killer. And it must be stopped.

She opens a void-built unseamed six-dimensional cage and dives forward. It moves, but too late; her hand swings and the sixth-dimensional gate shuts - she isn't quite sure how that works but it does in the moment, and that's all it needs to do. The entire container burns against her fingers but she carries it all the way back to the ops team, who high five her and congratulate her on saving one small town in Whales immediately and the world eventually.

Later, she will observe it in observation, and she will learn that it has a hostile will; that it is a hunter from beyond the stars. Other scientists will be surprised that something so simple could be so deadly, but Martha is not fooled.

She has seen the dangers that lie at the end of the galaxy.

But for now, Martha prefers to concentrate on the happier things in life. She goes home to a charming fiance and has coc au vin and a backrub, and she lets herself think about things beyond the night terrors that seem drawn to earth like a flame.

2\. "I'm Martha Jones," she says, and the mole-man staring at her flinches. This one has been here long enough to fear her; no doubt it has heard her legend in its crevice where the mole conspiracy has been plotting world domination since - well, she isn't sure. A long time, judging by the rich medieval-style crown that rests upon the mole leader's head.

The Mole-King presses his hands up against the plastic of the holding cell. It hisses, it's language sibilant but, still, recognizable: "You - Walker?!" It sniffs at her skin and growls. "Doctor-son."

"Not quite," she says, and wonders how long it will take until the time-radiation, as the Doctor called it once, will hit its half-life and fade away from her. She doesn't regret her travels, but she's so much more than a few months of her life spent with a grieving man.

"His scent on you." It grunts; its expression of doubt is almost human. She bites her cheek and tries not to laugh at the sight of the Mole-King, his mole-paws crossed and star-shaped nose twitching.

"We're acquainted," she says, then raises an eyebrow. "Have you met him?"

"Regrettably," it sniffs, and she shakes her head, wondering how many times she's going to need to clean up the Doctor's mistakes.

It's easy to take the high road, Martha has found, when you galavant off as soon as the danger has passed. When you're someone from Torchwood - like Martha - it's harder. There are long-term consequences, and saving Monday doesn't mean much if doing so dooms the Earth on Friday.

The Doctor's reputation, Martha has come to find, is a little bit over-stated.

"So, tell me your plan," she says, sitting in the chair provided outside the cell. "Were you working alone, or did you have help?"

It's likely that they had at least some alliance with the Lizard people under the Earth's crust, Martha knows, as ridiculous as that sounds. It takes some probing, but the Mole King confirms this is so before Martha has to resort to anything direr than a few simple questions. It knows she has taken down Daleks, Cybermen, and Timelords. It has heard the whispers of her walking the earth.

She will get a raise for this, and a promotion.

Later, she will go home and tell her husband Thomas about this. He will laugh at how her job throws her into such interesting situations, even more so than his adventures in the ER. Later, they will drink wine and make love, and Martha will forget, for a few moments, that some dangers lurk close to home.

3\. "Die!" Her husband screams at her, pointing a gun to her face.

Or, rather, the insubstantial ghost of the Gelth screams at her. It has tasted the doctor's particles on her, and it wants revenge. It is the last of its' people. It has taken her husband and walks in his skin, a grotesque puppet.

Her team leader is screaming at her to get back to the post, to let someone else deal with this. It's tempting, but Martha knows letting someone land the killing shot will do nothing to stop her pain.

She loves her husband. She loves the Earth more.

The knife is in her hands before she can fully think about it. By the time she grasps what she's doing, it's in his heart.

He looks at her, eyes growing dim.

"I love you," he says, her husband's voice given back to her for a cruel moment.

"Love you too," she says. There's nothing on the comms. Only the sound of her heart breaking.

4\. She stays in the house when the cleaners come, watches them remove Tom and slowly erase his existence around the house. It will be an accident, she knows, in the cover-up; maybe a random mugging gone wrong, a damn robbery. People will whisper sympathies in the street she doesn't need to hear.

She can barely take the pity the Torchwood cleaners show her, their eyes looking at her with a mix of respect and pity both. That above all things is her breaking point; she says she needs air and goes out to their (her, now) terrace. For the first time in her life, Martha wishes she smoked.

There's an odd sound of whumph behind her, a bit like the Tardis, coming to land. She turns and an energy vortex is near her - her reaction time slower than it would normally be, she barely blinks before a blond woman tumbles out, purple coat on her shoulder.

"Rose," she says.

"Who are you?" She says, tilting her head. "I'm looking for the Doctor - have you seen him?"

Martha stares her down as Rose looks at her, curiosity apparent. Maybe she'd be more amused by this if she hadn't killed the most important person in her life not an hour before. Rose reaches out and brushes a tear and says, "Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't - " and Martha feels her face flush. She isn't sure if she's angry or if she just feels pity for Rose, always ten steps behind her timelord.

"No, I wager you were rather too busy thinking about him," she says. She does not clarify who he is, any more than she would have to clarify who she is to the Doctor. The Doctor and Rose are binary stars, locked into a stable orbit only when shining upon one another. Apart, they constantly turn, searching only for one another.

Rose licks her lips and shakes her head. "I'm sorry. Whatever it is. I just - I don't have much time. Have you - "

"I did, once," Martha said, tartly. She notices Rose does not ask, and perhaps it is petty of her but she is still hurt by the constant, overwhelming focus on a man who isn't here, who only comes when it suits him to play hero. "Turns out I wasn't much good."

"I -" Rose opens her mouth and closes it, the awkward girl having to apologize for a crush. "Look, I'll just - "

"2008," Martha says, softly. "Summer. When the stars go dark - you'll find him then."

"Thanks," Rose says and places a hand on her shoulder. "What's your name? I'll tell the Doctor to come back. Fix whatever happened - "

Rose is already shimmering, and Martha just shakes her head. Rose shimmers and is gone, mouth still open before she winks back into her own universe.

Martha knows there's no point in calling the doctor. Some things are up to them to fix.

Tomorrow she will go to work and lock herself in her office. She would take leave, but there's no doing that when shes Martha Jones, defender of the Earth. Tomorrow she will power through, and she will keep herself focused only on saving what she can. She will stay longer in the office than is strictly necessary, sleeping in her chair. She will wake up at the dawn of a new day and surreptitiously duck out and grab a bag full of clothing, and she will avoid looking at the kitchen for as long as she can.

5\. "Who-Are-YOU?" shouts Suzy, as Martha ducks behind a desk and loads her service gun. Jack glares at her from across the table, eyes on fire. Jack does not like Suzy, an agent in their group who long went rogue. This is her fourth time back. Martha almost doubts that it will be her last.

Buth then, neither of her previous attempts included an upgrade to cyberization. Jack found it and called her in for back-up before Suzie could complete the process, but she's already gotten all her limbs and most of her torso cyberized. Only the head remains fully human, her eyes blank but awful.

Martha does not have time for this shit. She's dealt with the death of her husband and three threats from alien infections, invasions, and interruptions each, all in the span of a month. Martha is tired, tired of saving the world, tired of always being one of the ones on call.

Jack raises an eyebrow and crosses his thumb over his heart, an ancient style of communication. She nods. They aren't taking this one alive.

Jack, immortal and all the more terrifying for it, stands, providing a distraction. He fires and fires and fires, the loud bangs almost - but not quite - enough to drown out the loud _whump whump_ of the TARDIS coming in.

Martha doesn't bother to look while it materializes, though both Jack and Suzie do. Martha knows well now that the Doctor only shows up to play hero. Martha keeps her eyes on the target, aims her service revolver at the still flesh-and-blood head.

Martha isn't the best shooter, but even she can't miss from close up. The TARDIS' door opens and she fires.

It's a good shot, clean; Suzie crumples, barely aware of being shot before falling. Her eyes are blank and cold, and Martha kneels down and closes them.

"Why did you do that?" The Doctor asks, all rank and vitriol. His eyes burn with anger. "Why? The process wasn't complete. She could still be saved!" The Doctor looks at her, the wrath of time upon her, and Martha feels -- nothing.

"Ease up, Doc," Jack says, placing a hand on the Doctor's. The Doctor yanks it away, too much the Time Lord to respect the human custom. "She's just trying to save people."

"Saving one by killing another is - " He runs a hand through his messy hair, then stares back at her. "You're a doctor, you're supposed to save lives - "

"I did," she says.

"She's dead," the Doctor says, muttering. "She had so much promise and she's - "

"She's killed a lot of people," Jack says, pointing toward the three lab techs. "This isn't the first time she's come back, Doctor."

"I know, I know," the Doctor seethes. "But there's a way, there is always a way! Not death, not like this. Not through murder."

"I found my way, Doctor," she says, putting her gun back in her holster. The Martha of three years ago would have felt worse about disappointing the Doctor, would have been scandalized to have earned a time lord's wrath. Now, she's far beyond that. "I'm Martha <i>god damned</i> Jones, I know a thing about defending Earth," she says.

She walks out, and the Doctor, for once, listens and is silent.

Martha goes home and showers, Suzy's blood flowing down her drain. In an hour she will sleep, and she will dream fitfully. In four hours she will be awoken by a Torchwood alert, and Jack's apology, and she will go out into the field, and focus on nothing but keeping the World alive.

6\. "Martha, Mickey; Mickey, Martha," Jack says, pressing their arms together between Sycoraxian arrows and hand-axes raining down on them. "He's one of us time-travelers too!"

"With the Doctor," Mickey says, then moves on, quickly. He doesn't like talking about it, she can tell; his eyes are low, his voice not nearly as warm as it is when he says the next few words, "You're not ... _the_ Martha Jones, are you?"

"One and the same!" Jack shouts, before she can reply. Mickey looks at her with a mixture of awe and respect, then laughs.

"Damn," he says, then lifts his arm, deflecting an axe with a well-timed shield. "If we survive this, you're going to have to tell me some stories!"

And for the first time in months, she says she will.

In time, she will save the world, and she will tell Mickey about walking the world. She will go home, and Mickey will eventually follow. They will run and keep on running, and keep on fighting and saving the world.

They're god damned Smith and Jones, after all. The World needs them.


End file.
